13 AUG 2009
_______________________________________
*Gulf Air gets latest flight safety system from Austin
Digital, Inc.
*Sequa Corporation Names Mark V. Rosenker to Board of Directors
*CHRISTOPHER A. HART SWORN IN AS NTSB MEMBER
*Two die in plane crash at Eden Prairie airport (Beech-18)
*Essential airstrips fail to meet global standards (Australia)
*Chinese Court Accepts CRJ-200 Crash Case
*Boeing Statistical Study of Commercial
Airplane Accident-2008 (Attached)
****************************************
Gulf Air gets latest flight safety system from Austin
Digital, Inc.
National carrier Gulf Air has upgraded its flight safety standards by
acquiring an integrated state-of -the-art Flight Data Monitoring (FDM)
system, also known as Flight Operation Quality Assurance (FOQA) system.
The airline has recently signed a three year partnership with Austin
Digital, Texas, USA - a leading FOQA provider - to
implement the complete infrastructure at Gulf Air headquarters.
FDM is the systematic and pro-active use of digital flight data from routine
operations that helps an airline to improve its fleet safety. It is a well
accepted and mandatory part of today's safety management systems in global
aviation industry.
"Gulf Air has a well-established Accident Prevention and Flight Safety
Program and regularly upgrades its systems and procedures so that it
maintains the highest flight safety standards," said Gulf Air chief
operating officer Capt Chris Cain.
"The new integrated FDM system offers a robust and sophisticated
functionality to analyse and optimise our daily flight operations helping us
increase our fleet's technical dispatch reliability.
"The system also offers remote access to in-flight data that facilitates a
more efficient maintenance planning and in our daily aircraft system's
troubleshooting processes. Furthermore, the service offers a solid basis for
additional financial savings in the fields of guarantees and warranties, ATC
charges, fuel savings, etc," he added.
Besides setting up and implementing the FDM service, Austin Digital will
also provide continuous support to technical system operation and flight
safety/flight operations efficiency know-how after completion of the
project.-TradeArabia News Service
http://www.tradearabia.com/news/newsdetails.asp?Sn=TTN&artid=165737
****************
Sequa Corporation Names Mark V. Rosenker to Board of Directors
NEW YORK, NY UNITED STATES (Rosenker Led National Transportation Safety
Board Until July 2009)
NEW YORK, Aug. 12 /PRNewswire/ -- Sequa Corporation, a diversified
industrial company owned by The Carlyle Group, today named former National
Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairman Mark V. Rosenker to its Board of
Directors.
Rosenker, who held the top NTSB position until his resignation in July, also
retired as a Major General in the U.S. Air Force Reserve in December 2006,
after 37 years of combined active and reserve service. During a
distinguished career, Rosenker also served as Deputy Assistant to the
President and Director of the White House Military Office. In this position,
he was responsible for managing the military assets and personnel that
support the President and Vice President.
"Mark's leadership at the nation's top accident investigation agency and his
service and leadership at the Department of Defense is exemplary and will
bring vision and guidance to Sequa Corporation and its operating units,
particularly Chromalloy," said Peter J. Clare, Chairman, Sequa Corporation
Board of Directors.
Sequa Corporation operates as a holding company with four business units:
Chromalloy, ARC Automotive Inc., CASCO Products and Precoat Metals.
Chromalloy, the largest Sequa unit, is a worldwide supplier of gas turbine
engine repairs, components, and Parts Manufacturer Approval (PMA)
replacement parts used in commercial airline and military fleets, and by
industrial power and utility operators.
Rosenker was sworn in as the 11th Chairman of the National Transportation
Safety Board in 2006.
His two-year term as Chairman expired in August 2008 and he was nominated by
President Bush for a second two-year term as Chairman. Rosenker led the NTSB
as Chairman or Acting Chairman since March 2005, and until July was serving
his second five-year term as a member.
Beginning in 2001 until joining the NTSB, Rosenker served as Deputy
Assistant to the President and Director of the White House Military Office.
Prior to his White House appointment, Rosenker was Managing Director of the
Washington Office of the United Network for Organ Sharing.
Earlier he served as Vice President, Public Affairs, for the Electronic
Industries Alliance. His professional experience includes service in the
Department of the Interior, Federal Trade Commission and Commodity Futures
Trading Commission.
Rosenker entered the Air Force through the University of Maryland ROTC
program. He is a graduate of the Air Command and Staff College and Air War
College. During his Air Force service, he earned a number of awards and
decorations including two Air Force Distinguished Service Medals and the
Legion of Merit. He was a member of the Board of Visitors to the Community
College of the Air Force.
The Carlyle Group is a global private equity firm with significant expertise
in the aerospace, defense and information technology government services
sectors.
Sequa Corporation is a diversified industrial company with operations in the
aerospace, metal coatings and automotive industries. Sequa is a Carlyle
Group portfolio company. For additional information, visit www.sequa.com.
*************
CHRISTOPHER A. HART SWORN IN AS NTSB MEMBER
Christopher A. Hart was sworn in today as a Member of the
National Transportation Safety Board.
Member Hart joins the Board after a long career in
transportation safety, including a previous term as a Member
of the NTSB.
Most recently, Member Hart was Deputy Director for Air
Traffic Safety Oversight at the Federal Aviation
Administration. He was previously the FAA Assistant
Administrator for the Office of System Safety.
He served as a Member of the NTSB from 1990 to 1993. After
leaving the Board, he served as Deputy Administrator of the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. He had been
at the FAA since 1995.
From 1973 until joining the Board in 1990, Member Hart held
a series of legal positions, mostly in the private sector.
He holds a law degree from Harvard University and Master's
and Bachelor's degrees in Aerospace Engineering from
Princeton University. He is a member of the District of
Columbia Bar and the Lawyer-Pilots Bar Association.
Member Hart is a licensed pilot with commercial, multi-
engine and instrument ratings.
His term expires December 31, 2012.
***************
Two die in plane crash at Eden Prairie airport (Beech-18)
On his first flight in a plane he recently purchased, a 53-year-old Osceola,
Wis., man and an unidentified passenger died Wednesday in a fiery crash at
an Eden Prairie airport.
Wayne Monson had recently purchased the Beechcraft E18S airplane, a
50-year-old workhorse with twin-propellers and twin tail rudders. The
experienced pilot spent day after day at Flying Cloud Airport working to
make the plane airworthy.
On Wednesday morning, Monson and a passenger took off from the airport in
Eden Prairie en route to Osceola, Wis.
Moments after leaving the runway, witnesses said, the plane began teetering
back and forth, an engine chuffed black smoke and the Beechcraft fell from
the sky.
The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety
Board are investigating the accident, the first fatal plane wreck at the
airport since 2001.
No cause has been determined, and authorities have not officially released
the identities of the two victims in the plane. The FAA confirmed two people
died in the accident.
Monson's family said the father of 7 worked on airplanes for a living at
Ratech Machine in Osceola and had his pilot's license for at least 20 years.
They did not know who else was in the plane with Monson Wednesday when it
crashed.
The former Hibbing resident had three sons still living on the Iron Range -
the oldest is 19 - and kept a trailer home on property there so he could
visit them every weekend, said Lois
Rengstorf, the mother of his ex-wife. The two were still friends, she said,
and raised the boys together.
"He was going to take them all to Valley Fair after this plane testing,"
Rengstorf said. "He just got it ready for flying."
The plane had been on the ground at Flying Cloud for years, according to a
mechanic and pilot who did not want to be identified Wednesday. Monson had
only recently begun working on it.
The previous owner is listed as Beech Transportation Inc. in Eden Prairie,
http://www.twincities.com/ci_13045041?source=most_viewed
*****
Date: 12-AUG-2009
Time: 11:45am (app
Type: Beech E18S
Operator:
Registration: N3038C
C/n / msn: BA-374
Fatalities: Fatalities: 2 / Occupants: 2
Airplane damage: Written off (damaged beyond repair)
Location: Eden Prairie, MI - United States of America
Phase: Initial climb
Nature: Private
Departure airport: KFCM (Flying Cloud Apt., MI)
Destination airport: Wisconsin
Narrative:
Aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff from Flying Cloud Airport in Eden
Prairie.
(aviation-safety.net)
***************
Essential airstrips fail to meet global standards (Australia)
THE Federal Government has said it will do what it can to help bolster
aviation safety in Papua New Guinea, a nation renowned for having some of
the world's most difficult terrain and basic aviation infrastructure.
Mountainous territory and a lack of adequate roads mean locals and tourists
rely on aircraft for transportation.
However, regional landing strips often fall short of the standards of most
developed countries.
Compounding safety concerns in PNG is the absence of a fully operational air
crash investigator, despite numerous fatal accidents in the past decade and
pledges by the government to set up an Air Accident Commission in 2004.
The commission was supposed to investigate 19 crashes that had occurred
between 1999 and 2004, including one accident that claimed the lives of
three Australians in 1999.
The commission was finally established in July last year, just weeks before
an air safety audit from the International Civil Aviation Organisation,
though government sources in Australia and PNG say it is still not fully
operational.
A source from the PNG Department of Transport, who asked not to be named,
said the commission was hamstrung by a lack of government funding.
A former Kokoda Track Authority chairman, Warren Bartlett, said airstrips
across the country faced neglect, and that it was the poor condition of the
airstrip at Efogi which contributed to an Australian Defence Force Caribou
aircraft crashing there in October last year.
''There is a need to upgrade many airstrips in the country, especially the
rural ones,'' he said. Mr Bartlett said he has been pushing the Australian
and PNG governments to upgrade the Kokoda airstrip since 2006 so larger
aircraft could land there.
But no funding has been provided for the project, and it was put on the
backburner after Cyclone Guba hit in November 2007, Mr Bartlett said
The Foreign Affairs Minister, Stephen Smith, said yesterday that the
Australian regulators already worked closely with their PNG counterparts but
the Government would consider further safety measures.
''In the aftermath of a terrible event like this, again, we will do an
exhaustive assessment of what more we can do,'' he told Sky News.
The aviator Dick Smith said many of the airstrips in PNG would not pass
Australian standards. But, Mr Smith said, even with better regulation and
improved facilities accidents would still occur in PNG because of the
difficult terrain and notoriously bad flying weather.
Source: The Sydney Morning Herald
****************
Chinese Court Accepts CRJ-200 Crash Case
Relatives of the victims of a 2004 crash of a Bombardier CRJ-200 under
undertaking landmark litigation against the airframe manufacturer, engine
maker General Electric and operator China Eastern. A Chinese court's
acceptance of the case marks the first instance of air crash litigation
going to trial in the country. The crash at the Inner Mongolian city Baotou
on Nov. 21, 2004, killed 32. The relatives are seeking 123 million yuan
(US$18 million) in compensation.
http://www.aviationweek.com
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*Boeing Statistical Study of Commercial Airplane Accident-2008 (Attached)
*****************
Curt Lewis, P.E., CSP
CURT LEWIS & ASSOCIATES, LLC